Author:AP

I started my first weekly program in Consumer Psychology this week, and I’m planning on using this space to make notes, jot down musings, and integrate with my existing work.

What exactly is consumer psychology?

Understanding the behaviour of consumers and how it relates to the decisions they make, both big and small.

Looking at the research, consumer psychology addresses an array of subjects. Some of the more popular areas include decision-making, consumer judgement, perception and attention, information processing, motivational determinants of consumer behaviour, attitude formation and change, and influences of advertising upon consumer responses (Jansson-Boyd, 201o).

There’s also something to be said about how consumption makes them feel — we live in a world where signposting who you are as a person seems to be primarily through purchases.

The other day a friend and I discussed whether the vast majority of people would still certain purchase goods and services if they couldn’t tell anyone. Nobody knows the brand or the value. For instance, like Wiley, you buy and wear a Rolex. However, you’re not allowed to tell anyone, write a hit about it, or Instagram it. Would you still want one?

This thought-experiment is particularly interesting in the ‘age of the influencer’, which has been impacted by COVID-19. Who are you, and what is your brand if you can’t consume?

Influencers are supposed to be aspirational; they are supposed to be in places we want to be, in clothes we want to wear, doing things we want to do. Without that so-called “FOMO,” it’s hard to see what need they really serve.

Guess who’s back, back again… Last time we met, dear reader, it was a warm, endless, globe-trotting, city-hopping summer in another decade. Today, I write from my living room in East London where I have been watching the world go by, as the UK edges past two months in lockdown. What better time than now to invigorate my output?

Aside from a worldwide pandemic, a few things that are different: I have a relatively new job in UX writing in the music technology industry, which I love. I have a cat, which I love. There’s a man with a beard from Chicago who lives at my house, who I love. I have gained an MA in Digital Management and started an MSc in Business and Organisational Psychology, which excites me.

I’m hoping to move forward with this space, showcasing inspiration from and about the internet, UX practices, consumer psychology, writing and literature, and other ‘cool shit I like’.

🍽 The Pencilsword on a plate – a short comic about privilege by perennial favourite, Kiwi illustrator Toby Morris. LINK

🐕 A heart-warming piece on the human/doge relationship. Love rarely touches the reasoning parts of the brain. It touches the dreamy parts, the devoted parts—it touches the parts we sometimes call the heart. For many thousands of years, it’s there that our dogs have lived.LINK

🌝 This Friday the UK will see the longest lunar eclipse in a century. Blood moon! LINK

The otter is ninety percent water
Ten percent God.
This is a mastery
We have not fathomed in a million years.
I saw one once, off the teeth of western Scotland,
Playing games with the Atlantic –
Three feet of gymnastics
Taking on an ocean.

🦒 “The reputation laundering firm that ruined its own reputation”.A fascinating collapse – the Bell Pottinger story. Hits close to home as I was working in PR in London at the time, and am still a member of the PRCA… It’s a shocking story, but unfortunately, something that seems to happen again and again. LINK

She arrived at the country mansion in a silver limousine.
She’d sent out invitations and everything:
her name written twice with “&” in the middle,
the calligraphy of coupling.
She strode down the aisle to “At Last” by Etta James,
faced the celebrant like a keen soldier reporting for duty,
her voice shaky yet sure. I do. I do.
“You may now kiss the mirror.” Applause. Confetti.
Every single one of the hundred and forty guests
deemed the service “unimprovable.”
Especially the vows. So “from the heart.”
Her wedding gown was ivory; pointedly off-white,
“After all, we’ve shared a bed for thirty-two years,”
she quipped in her first speech,
“I’m hardly virginal if you know what I mean.”
(No one knew exactly what she meant.)
Not a soul questioned their devotion.
You only had to look at them. Hand cupped in hand.
Smiling out of the same eyes. You could sense
their secret language, bone-deep, blended blood.
Toasts were frequent, tearful. One guest
eyed his wife — hovering harmlessly at the bar — and
imagined what his life might’ve been if
he’d responded, years ago, to that offer in his head:
“I’m the only one who will ever truly understand you.
Marry me, Derek. I love you. Marry me.”
At the time, he hadn’t taken his proposal seriously.
He recharged his champagne flute, watched
the newlywed cut her five-tiered cake, both hands
on the knife. “Is it too late for us to try?” Derek whispered
to no one, as the bride glided herself onto the dance floor,
taking turns first to lead then follow.

🎹 Angélique Kidjo on the myth of cultural appropriation and covering Talking Heads’ Remain in Light in its entirety. Including this magical version of Once in a Lifetime, one of my spirit songs. LINK

“Humans have moved from a world where they met only a few hundred people during their entire lifetime, to encountering that many strangers riding the subway or attending a conference,” says Rollag. “We are out of our element from an evolutionary standpoint, and our minds and cognitive abilities are still catching up.”

🎯 “If I start from the basic assumption that attention is life, then how I cultivate my attention and direct it, is how I live and cultivate my life. To not spend time obsessing about this to a certain extent is sort of saying, ‘I don’t particularly care how my life unfolds.” –Jocelyn K. Glei’s Hurry Slowly is one of the most thought-provoking podcasts I listen to, and the ideas around attention in this interview with Jonathan Fields really resonated. LINK

🌾 Sensing a theme yet? Introducing Winnow, a podcasting directory and support network for women, non-binary people, and their co-hosts. It’s the first intervention for my Hyper Island innovation project. To winnow is to blow a current of air through (grain) in order to remove the chaff… I also like the potential of a WIN NOW interpretation. LINK

This week I am also thinking about:

I became a UK citizen after nearly seven years! Hurrah. My friend Lisa took me out for Pimms afterwards, the quintessential celebration.

While I am a known plant nerd, it appears I sleep-bought a membership to the Royal Horticultural Society last month… I also visited Kew Gardens this weekend.

Being a ‘project’ person versus those who don’t have a massive array of personal, usually unpaid projects always on the go. While some of this is currently attributed to my masters’, there has and always will be those projects. Kindred, Book Club for Drunks, zines, films, bars…

I’m going to introduce myself to JuneIt’s my first summer in so many moonsI’m gonna eat ice cream outside a used bookstoreGonna buy a used book when I go inI’m gonna buy me a banana seat bikeAnd spend my time with people I likeAnd save my love for my dog and the stars that fallOver old Lake Michigan.

My sentiment for the summer. ‘Introduction to June’ by the Capital Sunrays [via AskMefi]

Here’s my favourite bit on the subject editing, which rings true. The story usually does have a life of its own!

Editing is crucial because in my experience anything you try to make – what YOU want is for the story to be AMAZING. But what the story wants to be is MEDIOCRE OR WORSE. And the entire process of making the story is convincing the story to not be what it wants to be, which is BAD.

And for broadcasters and podcasters:

…Be in the tape! Cajoling, hondling, joking with, arguing with, interacting with your interviewees. It’s the single easiest way to make your stories better. Be in the tape. An interview properly done is a drama with two characters and not being in there as one of the characters is giving up one of your greatest powers. Don’t leave that power unused. Be in the tape. Don’t settle for less. Don’t do less than you can. Be in the tape.